EYE OF CAT

KIRKUS REVIEW

Familiar Zelazny notions (shape-shifting, psi powers), a hunt scenario, and plenty of embroidered Indian lore--in a poetic drama that fizzles. Retired big-game hunger William Blackhorse Singer, last of the traditional Navajo shamans, has been requested by the government to prevent the assassination of an alien diplomat. Needing some psi-powered help, Singer turns to Cat, a shape-shifting telepath he once hunted and captured, now hiding his intelligence as an exhibit in a zoo. They strike a bargain: Cat will dispose of the assassin--in return for a chance to hunt Singer the way Singer hunted Cat. Soon, then, a globe-spanning Cat-and-mouse sequence develops, during which Singer's twin Navajo/white man selves also meet and battle in the spirit world. But, though beefed up with stream-of-consciousness passages and a subplot or two, the Indian lore isn't in the Tony Hillerman class--and this is for the most part Zelazny at his most fractured, slight, and lackadaisical.

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